


Restless Dead

by popsicletheduck



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Blood, Gen, Minor suicidal ideations, Nightmares, Survivor Guilt, Vomiting, cassandra is not okay someone help her please
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-22
Updated: 2017-07-22
Packaged: 2018-12-05 07:35:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11573391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/popsicletheduck/pseuds/popsicletheduck
Summary: In the wake of Percy's revelation after coming back from Marquet, Cassandra dreams. It's not exactly pleasant.Spoilers through Episode 101





	Restless Dead

Cassandra is dreaming.

In her dream, she’s back at the top of the ziggurat, dressed in her mother’s armor, sword in one hand, dagger in another. 

There’s blood on the blades. She’s not sure whose it is.

The darkness seems to stretch on infinitely around her. No light, no sound, nothing but her and the blood on her blades.

“You didn’t struggle.” The voice comes from behind her and she turns. There, illuminated slightly by flickering hammer he holds, stands the goliath. Blood runs freely down his chest, his arms. She knows both is and isn't her doing.

“You didn’t struggle,” he repeats. “Didn’t beg. You just hung there.”

She shudders at the memory of it, held by her throat above the gaping void. “I know.”

“Why not.” 

“I don’t know, I-”

“Why not.” The words ring with more force than they should, echoing in the nothingness around her. Echoed by the figures that step out of the darkness. Her father. Her mother. Julius. Vesper. Whitney. Ludwig. Oliver. Percy as he looked then next to Percy as he looked the day she found him in Sarenrae’s temple. Father Reinald. Archibald. People from Whitestone, people she had fought next to. People she had sentenced to death without ever seeing. A chorus of a single question she has no answer for.

A sudden pain spikes in her head, growing with every passing second. It knocks the wind out of her, drives her to her knees. There’s something prying into her brain, something trying to get inside. Her blades hit the ground with a ringing clatter as she presses her hands to the sides of her skull, a scream caught in her throat.

“My dear.” This voice is soft, gentle. The pain in her head increases.

“No, no, you’re dead,” she pushes out between clenched teeth. “You’re dead, I killed you.”

“Do you really think you could be rid of me that easily?” A hand reaches down and rests against her cheek, tilting her face up.

In front of her stands Delilah Briarwood. 

There’s not a speck on her velvet and brocade dress or a single hair out of place in her elegant updo. She is the very picture of grace, of power, cool and calculating. She smiles, but it’s merely a movement of her face. It doesn’t reach her eyes. They are hard and cold, like chips of ice.

“You’ve been a very bad girl, Cassandra. And bad little girls must be punished.”

A sudden ice cold burn floods every inch of her being. The darkness shifts into blinding white. A scream echoes to nowhere.

 

Cassandra wakes choking back a scream.

She tries to breath, starts to mentally recite her litany of comfort, her reminders of reality. The Briarwoods are gone. Silas is dead. Delilah is-

_“A cult who’s being led...by Delilah Briarwood.”_

Percy’s words rush back with all the delicacy of a sledgehammer.

She makes it to the chamber pot before she starts retching again.

Not that there’s much to come up. She hasn’t eaten much these past couple of days.

A knock at the door. “Lady Cassandra? Are you alright?” Trish. Since the recent revelation of what the orb truly is, security has been increased everywhere. Nobody is taking chances when it comes to this.

Cassandra takes a moment to breath, to swallow back the bile and compose herself. “I’m fine.”

She’s a lady. Lying is second nature to her.

 

_“They’re going to need us to be the strongest. I have faith in you.  
“I’m so sorry.”_


End file.
